Carolina sweet potato growers target gourmet market

What is in this article?:

After the buyout, sweet potatoes grown for gourmet markets looked better than tobacco.

Three years ago, a group of tobacco growers who farm near the Sauratown Mountain Range in central North Carolina were looking for an alternative crop.

Although this area is far from the state’s prime sweet potato-producing region, the farmers had enough experience growing it on a small scale that they believed they could make money producing it. But they produced it as a high-quality gourmet food item rather than as a commodity.

They were helped considerably when they learned about a local variety of sweet potato that has deep purple skin and flesh. The purple variety gave the growers a unique product to market, and they have built their program around it.

They put it in North Carolina State University’s micropropagation program to clean it of any plant viruses, paid the fee for exclusivity rights and named it Stokes Purple.

In the first year of the Saura Pride program, five growers produced 10 acres. The next year, there were 10 growers, and they planted 25 acres. Then last year, the third of the program, 16 growers produced 80 acres of sweet potatoes.

Two of the growers were in Forsyth County, one was in Surry County and the rest were in Stokes County, which surrounds the Sauratown range. All of the growers either grow tobacco now or have in the past.

Most Saura Pride sweet potatoes are Stokes Purples. But they also grow a few orange sweet potatoes of the Beauregard variety and a few white sweet potatoes of the O’Henry variety. These are mostly for local demand.

The primary marketing vehicle for Saura Pride sweet potatoes has become grocery stores, including three chains that emphasize healthy food choices — Whole Foods, Earth Fare Healthy Supermarkets and The Fresh Market. A few are also sold to grocery stores in the Sauratown area.

There are several smaller markets. Some Saura Pride sweet potatoes are sold at state farmers markets and local produce markets. Also, a few local restaurant owners like them because of the health benefits and eye appeal, says Mike Sizemore, president of the Saura Pride company.

And Saura Pride has found a new marketing method that so far has given good results. The company has started shipping orders received on the company’s website http://www.saurapride.com .

“Since October, we have shipped 2,000 pounds in 10-, 20- or 40-pound bags based on orders from the website,” says Sizemore. “We are certainly making the UPS people happy.”

But one marketing method that seemed to hold a lot of promise hasn’t worked out, at least not yet.

In 2008, the farmers arranged with a North Carolina processing company to process the Stokes Purple sweet potatoes into a puree that could be used in any recipe that called for sweet potatoes.